When you're too busy to return to a project you've been working on, it's easy to just let it drift away. But, speaking with the New York Times, author Clay Shirky suggests that even if you feel like you're behind on a project, all you need to do is reorganize.

Authors are just as distracted by the internet as the rest of the us. The New York Times spoke with a few different people about their distraction-busting means, but Clay Shirky, author of Cognitive Surplus: Creativity and Generosity in a Connected Age has a response for a problem we're all probably familiar with: picking up a project you're behind on. Here's what he had to say:

Some days were too busy to write, which is O.K., but I wanted to make sure that no weeks were, so every Monday, I take a look at what I did in the last week. Weeks of no real progress were red flags, and I'd reorganize the following week to get back on track. Then, every month, I'd create a new folder, imaginatively called something like March, and drag over only the "live" files - drafts or versions I was still working on.

It's interesting that sometimes all you really need to get back on track for a project is a little reorganization. Personally, I've noticed that when I start reorganizing something, I almost always end up jumping right into it afterwards because the reorganization makes the project something fresh and new to get excited about.